Pet Care Veterinary Hospital

Our veterinary hospital is interested in hosting fourth-year
veterinary students in an externship program. Founded in 1984, the
hospital holds a four year AAHA accreditation and received a Practice
of Excellence Award from Veterinary Economics in 2000. We have
previously hosted senior veterinary students from numerous veterinary
colleges in the Midwest, the East Coast and overseas. Our interests
include exotics (avian, reptiles, ferrets, rabbits, and other small
mammals), orthopedics (including bone plating), feline medicine and
surgery, behavior, geriatrics and advanced dentistry. Our hospital is
equipped with a double surgery suite, four isoflurane/sevoflurane
anesthetic machines, Abaxis Vet Scan Chemistry and Hematology analyzers,
digital radiology, a variety of anesthetic monitoring equipment
including capnography, pulse oximetry, ECG monitoring and Doppler blood
pressure, a tonopen and a multipurpose rigid endoscope. We see a wide
variety of cases-we may see a140 pound Great Dane for one appointment,
and the next appointment may be a 50 gram hamster. The doctors have a
good camaraderie and enjoy learning from each other. We would welcome
the extern and would enjoy learning from them as well.

Institutional Resources:

Dr Fisher is credentialed for ABVP, Exotic Companion Mammal, and will sit for the exam November, 2012

Educational Resources Available:

We
have a complete up-to-date library of texts and journals, practice
evidence based medicine and have clinical rounds twice daily

Responsibilities Expected of Participating Students:

It
is the goal of our veterinary and technician staff that the extern
receive as much practical experience with small animals and exotics as
possible. Our 4 doctors keep up on their CE and practice good quality
small animal medicine with a clientele that generally goes for thorough
workups. Students should anticipate assisting doctor in small animal
and exotic species medical workups and offering opinions. Expect to be
quizzed! We have three licensed veterinary technicians that can be very
helpful in the art of venipuncture, catheter placement, clin path and
anesthesia. All students should be able to experience and hopefully
perform these techniques in a variety of exotic species as well as dogs
and cats. Students should anticipate doing routine surgeries (spay,
neuters) in dogs and cats and be able to assist with more difficult soft
tissue or orthopedic procedures. This depends on comfort level and
experience of the individual. We work with cat, ferret and rabbit
rescue groups and student should anticipate being exposed to cat spays
and neuters (students do many of these), ferret adrenalectomies, rabbit
spays and neuters. Exotic mammal medical caseload is significant. Our
avian caseload is fairly heavy as well and we see anywhere from 3-8
avian cases a day. Reptiles- 1-2 case per day. We are always seeing
something unique on a daily basis when it comes to our surgeries, so
exposure will vary with what comes in the door.

Student Supervision:

Our
hospital is open 8-7 Mon- Thurs., 8-5:30 on Fri and 7-12 noon on Sat.
We take Sun off. Extern would be expected to work as many of those
hours as they desire. Minimal requirements as outlined by your
individual university should be followed (currently minimum is 40 hours per week).